Directions: Read the story. Unscramble the words below and enter them in the boxes. Click the button to check your work.
Henri Rousseau was born in northwest France in the city of Laval. He liked to
draw, and he enjoyed music. He played the clarinet. Once he wrote a waltz and
named it for his wife. He served for a time in the French army, and when he
was discharged he worked as a toll collector for the city of Paris. His
friends called him Le Douanier which means custom official, but actually he
just collected toll money. When he was 49 years old he retired from this job
and devoted the rest of his life to painting. He was a primitive artist; self
taught. He would go to the Louvre and copy the paintings. Even when he started
making his own paintings he sometimes copied from other artists. He enjoyed
going to the botanical garden in Paris and looking at the plants and the zoo
animals. Then he would make a painting with plants in it, but instead of
making the plants their actual size, he would make them as big as trees. This
made the picture look like a fantasy world. Many people just laughed at his
paintings because they looked so unreal. However, some well known artists such
as Picasso saw the value in his work. Picasso even gave a banquet in his
honor. As a rather lonely man, he died at the age of 66 from a leg infection.
Only seven people attended his funeral. About a year after his death his
paintings began to sell, but he didn't live to see the recognition he craved.